Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1887-07-20
LAW COURT PROCEEDINGS.
The Franklin County Cases First to be
Heard-The Belcher Will Case in
Which Bates College is Interested.

PORTLAND, July 10.
The law court for the Western District
opened at Portland, Tuesday morning. The
justices present were Peters, c. j., Walton.
Virgin, Libby, Haskell and Foster. The
cases from Franklin county were the first
called. 10 these are the Belcher " ill case, in
which Bates College is interested This as
sumes really the form of two cases. The
first is Nathen F. Backus ct els, appellants
from the decree of the Judge of Probate OF
Franklin county, approving the will of Mrs.
Belcher. The second Is Sarah E. Stanley,
appellant from the decree of the Probate
Court. appointing President Cheney executor.
Mr.. Backus is a nephew and Mrs. Stanley is
niece of Mrs. Belcher.
Judge Symonds, who is counsel for the
College made the first argument. His points
were briefly as follows
The question of the power of the Supreme
Court to change the venue of a probate ap-
peal for the purpose of jury trial is pending
in the law term at Portland and was argued
to day. The points of the brief for the pro-
ponents of the will are, that the power to
change the venue, or the county IN which q
case is to be tried, for the purpose of securing
an impartial jury trial is one that has been
freely exercised in the common law courts in
England and this country, at least from the
beginning of the seventeenth century, having
been more or less obscurely recognized and
gradually developed from a much earlier
period; that the reports are full of instances
in which the power has been actually exer-
cised by the common law judges on grounds of
discretion, and without the aid of any express
statutory authority therefor; that courts Of
general common law jurisdiction may protect
the purity of jury trial in this respect just as
in many other respects they exercise inciden-
tai common law authority over the action of
juries; that this is power inherent in them
as common law courts and not dependent up
on the express provisions of statutes author
izing change of venue-but if the statute were
to be regarded as the sole source of authority
in this respect, the statute is not in derogation
of the common law and therefore to be strict
ly construed, but on the contrary declaratory
and restorative of ii, and to be broadly and
literally applied. so that the remedy provided
shall cover the whole field of the evil and
danger against which the statute intended to
guard that there is no class of cases in which
the power to change the venue is more i'm
portant than in that nvolving the sanity of
testators and the validity of wills; that the
title of the original act which authorizes a
change of venue in this State, and its terms,
require its application to probate appeals, its
purposes and objects can only be served by
adopting this construction, and for the court
to narrow the intended scope of this remedial
statute by strict Interpretation is simply to
deprive itself, arbitrarily and unnecessarily,
of useful and benefcent power.
Cases were cited from the reports of this
State and other New England States, which
it was claimed were direct sdjudications in
favor of the construction for which the pro-
ponents contended.